measuring up: what are your web site's vital statistics?

The statistics that matter are the ones that tell you how visitors are using your web site. This article uncovers the key information in your visitor logs that can show you the way to make your web site more effective. Not just how many visitors you are getting, but also where they came from, how long they are staying and what they are doing when they are there, as well as whether you have them coming back for more.

Why do visitor stats matter? Because changing your web site costs you time and money, and you need some way of measuring the effectiveness of your changes. If you are lucky you may be able to measure the increase in sales or enquiries. But it is likely that many changes will result in more subtle differences. For example, visitors may spend longer on your site or return to it more often. If you know which developments make the most difference you can build on them to bring you more business in the long term.

Your web site's vital statistics are stored in log files and in this article I will explain what they are, how to access them and what valuable information they can reveal about your site.

What are visitor logs?

Your web site sits on a computer that is running server software (the software that 'serves' up web pages to anyone that requests them). The server keeps track of every single request for a web page and records the details in a continually updated log file.

Your hosting company will tell you how to access your logs (if they don't provide access to the logs then find another host). Some hosts even provide online visitor reports. If these don't give you enough information then you will either need to access the raw log files and use a software package such as Web Trends to build reports, or ask your web designer to do it for you (at DesignSpring we provide customised visitor reports for several of our clients).

What vital information do your visitor logs reveal?

Analyse your logs and you can find all sorts of valuable information that will help you to plan your web site's development. They can help you to make sure that you are spending your money in the most productive areas. The most useful statistics are:

• Visitor numbers: how many different people are visiting your site every day? You'll need this figure to work our your conversion rate and also if you want to sell advertising space on your site. Note that 'unique visitors' is a more useful stat than 'hits' which counts graphic and multimedia files as well as the actual pages and gives you over-exaggerated results.
• Conversion rate: what percentage of these visitors go on to perform the action that you most want them to, for example ordering a product or filling in an enquiry form? If you are a specialist business then as you fine tune your site you may actually attract less visitors, but your conversion rate may go up because a higher percentage of your visitors are potential customers.
• Which pages do visitors typically see first? A significant number of visitors may be seeing pages other than the home page first. What kind of first impression do these pages make?
• What phrases did visitors type into search engines in order to find your site? This tells you a lot about why people are visiting your site and will give you ideas for targeting search terms that will attract even more visitors. It can also show you if your pages are attracting people for the 'wrong' reasons - people who are unlikely to buy your services.
• How many pages does a typical visitor see? Find out if you are catching your visitor's interest and encouraging them to explore. The longer that they spend on your site, the more likely they are to remember it and pay it a repeat visit.
• What are the most common routes through the site? Are there any 'dead ends' that need more work to encourage visitors to keep on exploring?
• Which pages do visitors see first and then leave without seeing any others? Could these 'single access' pages be developed to make them more successful at drawing people into the site?

How to use the logs

Because of the way that the Internet works it is difficult to get accurate visitor numbers. For example, the server may not always recognise a repeat visitor and your visitor reports may mix human visitor figures with those from automated 'robots' (usually sent by search engines to index your pages). Unless you have sophisticated log analysis software and a raft of technical tricks up your sleeve, it is fairly safe to say that you cannot rely on your visitor logs to show you exact figures.

In fact, for most small to medium sites this doesn't really matter. The key to using your visitor logs is to look for trends over a period of time. If you change the site do the figures go up or down? and by what percentage?  Here is the basic process:

• Collect the statistics: regularly enter the key figures into a spreadsheet including visitor numbers, top entry pages, top single access pages, top paths through the site, average number of pages viewed per visit and average length of visits.
• Make some changes to the site: note that a few simple changes will be easier to monitor than a major overhaul.
• Carry on collecting the stats: look for trends relating to the changes that you made.
• Allow time for the changes to take effect: remember that it may take 4 to 5 weeks for changes to show up in search engine results.
• Analyse the results: work out which changes made the most difference and are worth developing further.

home  |  disclaimer

© 2002-2005 DesignSpring  all rights reserved
last updated: 17/08/05